Grandfathers are an underated resource. Often they are much wiser than we give them credit for. But youth tends to recognize worth in the aged only when it is too late to learn from their vast reserves of experience and knowledge. How much are people doomed to learn and relearn and learn once more, because we choose not to listen to the stories of our elders. Not an easy question to answer, though my guess is that those very same elders, have pondered it themselves and may provide some insight.
Volodymyr Barahura is my grandfather. An author and a journalist he, like many Europeans this century, was forced to flee his homeland and make a new life in North America. Always a stern figure, he inspired apprehension at the very least in me as a child. Only now have I grown familiar enough with him to realise that his life was as full of discovery, love, learning, even sorrow and disappointment as mine own. He and others of his generation aren't for this world much longer and their memories will disappear with them.
I have decided, as a first step to acquaint myself with this noble man that I've always known as Dzyadzyo, to translate some of his writings from his native tongue, Ukrainian, into English, to better understandthe world he left behind in Europe. Perhaps, them I will know what it is that I would like to learn from him.
What will follow over the next few months, perhaps longer, are my selections from the five books that Volodymyr Barahura has published in the last two decades. I hope that you may discover something in them as well.
Please keep in mind that this project is a work in progress and the translations may change from time to time as I gain a better understanding of Ukrainian and the colloquialisms used in my Dzyadzyo's prose.
Enjoy and remember that no part of the following works can be reproduced in part or in full without my permission.
Coming soon, in fits and starts, translated excerpts from the following books:
| The Cranberry Tree Bridge | |
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| The Sword and the Book | |
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| Memories of an Ordinary Man | |
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| How I Became a Journalist | |
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| Encounter with a Mermaid | |
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